Nowhere to Go But Out: The Collision Between Transgender and Gender-Variant Prisoners and the Gender Binary in America’s Prisons

This article begins by first introducing unfamiliar readers to transgender and gender-variant people, and why some of them end up in prison (Part I). Part II shows that conditions of confinement produce particular gendered forms of punishment that reinforce gender roles and argues that prison systems are so thoroughly gendered that TG/GV prisoners become special targets for abuse because their genders pose greater threats to penal regimes that inculcate gender roles by force. Part III delves into the experiences of TG/GV prisoners in a variety of prison housing settings, and Part IV concludes by offering some immediate recommendations to improve TG/GV prisoner safety and long-term strategies that will resolve the dilemma of TG/GV prisoner abuse by reducing rates of TG/GV incarceration.